The Divergent Games II: Obscene Realizations
by Renee Belladonna
Summary: Chapter II of "The Divergent Games". In this part of the story you get more of a taste for Renee's bitter personality, as do you of Cameron Janson's, Renee's fellow Dauntless tribute from District 11, as well as the only Divergent from Renee's district.


My lashes flutter open to the sight of white light reflected off my pale, trembling fingers. After a few seconds, I'm greeted by the aching memory of the last time I was conscious. I fainted. _I fainted! _In front of all of District 11, in front of my fellow Dauntless. But what's even worse, it had been on live television. Everyone in the districts, the Summit and the Capitol saw my flunk. What a repulsive act of _sheer_ cowardice! Even if I made it back home alive, which is very unlikely, I would be rejected by all the Dauntless in District 11. Perhaps not Kelli, maybe not even my mother, but everyone else would force me into years of humiliation.

But the remembrance doesn't tag me for long. No, only for a few seconds, probably a minute before I realize I am not alone in my bedroom quarters on the train. A man sits at the end of my bed, smiling down at me as my vision plays into focus. His hair is a caramel color, and it hangs down in waves a little past his chin. His skin is a perfect shade of olive, like my mother's, only my mother's features are rough like any Dauntless aged twenty to thirty years old. He's smooth, I can tell just by looking at him. His face is utterly flawless, free of acne, scars and freckles. His eyes are a bright hazel, and as he grins down at me with gleaming white teeth, he puts a long, ragged hand on my own that notifies me he does a lot of work with them.

"I know you," I say in a tired, early morning voice. "You're Blake Travetts, from Amity."

"And the Divergent from three years ago, yes, that's me." he smiles even wider. I definitely remember him. Winner of the third year of the Divergent Games, the first tribute from District 11 to go into the Games and come back alive. It's difficult for me to contemplate how someone from Amity could become Divergent, the faction that values peace. Yet he did, but I cannot remember how exactly he won. All that comes to mind was that he was really good with plants.

"You better get ready, we're only two hours away from the Summit." he stands, and walks over to the door as I swing my legs over the side of the bed. Just when he's about to leave, he turns back to me and grins. "Try not to faint again when your cosmetologists get a hold of you." he teases, and then disappears down the hallway. A remark like that should've made me irritated, but because it's so early in the morning and I'm going to die soon anyway, it lightens me a bit. I try to hold in my smile, but I knew Blake had already seen it before he left.

I take a warm shower, and after seeing Blake's gleaming white smile, well, let's just say I brushed my teeth way longer than two minutes. After pulling on a long sleeve, cotton black shirt and dark shorts, I tie my hair back the way I usually do, and apply a coat of mascara to my lashes and some brown liner to my waterline. I walk out of my quarters barefoot, and after getting lost several times, I finally found the dining cart.

Long tables and stands hold several varieties of decorative cakes, cupcakes, muffins, strudels and other pastries I can't even name. Plates upon plates supported exquisite chops and roasts of meat and every type of egg is available and cooked whatever way you could think of. Silver jugs of wine, cider, brandy, milk and juice have been set out. But the thing that utterly ruins this amazing display of meat, fruit, vegetables and desserts is the sight of Cameron Janson already eating at the dining table.

I try not to make eye contact with him as I fill up my plate with eggs, bacon, a muffin and fresh toast, with a metallic glass of cider in the other hand. When I sit down to eat, I make sure I'm as far away from him as possible. When I look out the window, I see trees and deserts and mountains passing along. I know I'm on the train to the Summit, but I can barely feel the thing moving. I keep my head down as I eat, remembering how my family could not afford food as tasty as this. Sure, we bought eggs and sometimes meat from the butcher, but that food wasn't even half as fresh and good as this. It was like these eggs had just been laid by the chickens, scrubbed and polished and then cooked on an ultra deluxe cooking stove while the meat had just been sliced off and kneaded down before put on a fancy Summit grill to sizzle. I know that all the poultry and livestock comes from District 10, but this is nothing like how the food looked when I imagined it.

I've finished eating everything but my muffin by the time Cameron speaks up. "So, Renee." he starts, and I try to ignore him. "What are you trying to do?" I glance up as he leans on the table towards me. His eyebrows are raised like he really expects me to understand what he's asking.

"What are you talking about?" I say, after gulping down a sip of cider.

"The whole collapsing thing. I know it was fake. No Dauntless faints. Ever." he pulls back away from the table and lays himself back on the spines of the chair he sits in, crossing his arms.

"Then I guess I've set a new record." I retort in a nonchalant voice, since I really don't want to deal with him now. He was taller than me, with broad shoulders and muscles twice as big as mine when he flexed. His hair was shaggy and black, and his eyes were an intimidating green. He was tanned like most white citizens of District 11, and I guess he could've been handsome if I didn't hate him so much. I knew I could bat better than him. I could. But our size difference told otherwise.

"Then you're a coward." he snorts, "And you won't make it ten minutes in these Games." he slyly averts his gaze to the window, like he's won this argument. Well, me being a hot headed person, my short temper gets the best of me. I plant my hands on the table hard, and stand up, pushing my chair a few feet back away from me. I grab the sharpest knife I can find from my silverware set, and hold it up in the air, pointing the tip at him.

"They're already sending me to my death, as they are yours. Neither of us are going to get out alive, so I have no problem with severely injuring you now." I say it in just a loud enough voice to be threatening, but also low enough to state that I am not going to be the first one to lose my nerves and start yelling like any unstable Dauntless would. Cameron stands also and picks up an even longer knife, and points it straight back at me.

"You think I can't do this?" he says, his voice shaking from anger. "When that gong rings, you're going to be the first one I kill!" he's shouting now, and no matter how long he keeps this up, deep in his mind he'll know that I've already won our dispute. "You damn Dauntless poser, when I get my hands on you-"

Just then, the doors to the dining cart slid open and Blake stepped in. Cameron turned around to see him, immediately lowering his knife, but slowly. He already knew Blake had been watching us, as did I, but I don't care. "Let's put the knives down, now. Save that for training when you actually have to prove your strength to somebody." Blake states, and then fills up his own platter. Cameron, I guess he was just extremely furious with me, hurls his knife at the wall and it embeds itself into the paneling. He storms out, and before the dining cart doors can close on him, he flips me the bird. And instead of sending the gesture right back, I mouth the words he meant to me, to him.

Luckily, Blake didn't see that, because he would probably go off on some peace and earth loving lecture to the both of us. I reluctantly sit back down in my chair, but I keep my knife clutched in my hand, just in case Cameron decides to make reappearance. Blake makes his way back to the table, and sees the knife in the wall. Fortunately, all he does is sigh and sit down.

"Those are the Career type." Blake says, and then stuffing a fork full of eggs in his mouth. After he chews and swallows, her speaks again. "The ones that can't control their emotions. But most Careers eventually go insane with the power they believe they possess whether they win or lose, and neither way ends well." he's talking about both of us, me _and_ Cameron. I may not have lost my cool first, but I was close to it. Plus, I was the one to start the knife fight.

"That's the kind of thing I would expect an Amity to say. But Cameron and I are Dauntless. It's in our nature to get angry." I don't look up from my glass of cider, but I know Blake stares at me.

"It's in a Dauntless' nature to be brave, more in the children who are born into Dauntless, but still. You should not have done that. It was not wise to have already created an enemy for yourself, Renee." and then yes, I do remember. Cameron was Candor before he was Dauntless, and he just went through Initiation a few months ago. It happens when you're sixteen, whether you decide to leave your faction or not. You must participate in a series of tests to prove whether you are worthy for the faction you chose, or whether you are to be sent out onto the streets with the factionless, those who have failed Initiation or have been born from a citizen without faction. Candor value truth, so I know that Cameron could have probably sensed it if I was faking my faint, but I wasn't. So he must've thought I was just an excellent liar and made an assumption about my fall. Honestly, I'd like to say my faint was fake too, but I know it wasn't.

"We already hated each other. Us going into the Divergent Games together wouldn't have changed that, and neither is some peace harboring hippie from Amity." and with that, I stood from the table and stomped out of the dining cart with a scowl imprinted across my cheeks. I didn't know where I was going, but eventually I found a living room and I ended up sitting on a couch that faces a wide and long window on the train. Miles and miles of trees were rushing by, and just the sight of them reminded me of home. Especially of the woods I would pass through to get to the diamond Kelli and I played baseball in. The thought made me ache, and I started to crave the touch and feel of my metal bat. It already felt like it'd been years since I'd last seen it, last played with it. But then the green of the forests loses touch with my train window and is replaced by a gleaming blue city, which can be no other place other than the Summit.

I swallowed the anxious lump in my throat, and stood. I left the window and the living room and somehow I made my way back to my bedroom quarters on the train. I slipped on shoes like the ones I used to wear back home that would flip outwards at my ankle, and started walking back to the dining cart. Thankfully, Blake was no longer there. He must have gone back to his room as well to freshen up. After walking through the dining cart, I made way to a new room that looked like an entry way for the richer citizens of District 11, only five times as fancy. For a few minutes I just stood there at the window, watching the city go by. And then the room became dark, and I realized we were going through a tunnel.

When the light beamed again, I had to squint, what with all the moving colors in front of my eyes. I heard Cameron and Blake enter the room, and we all watched stunned as thousands of Summit citizens cheered for their latest tributes. Well, maybe not Blake. He's obviously seen this kind of thing before, three times now. The train became dark again and we reached into a halt, and I guess we must have come to the station that connected to the Remake Center. Almost immediately, Officials hustled into the entrance way to the train and escorted Blake, Cameron and I out. We split up with two guards behind each of us, and I was sent into a cold, metallic room.

There was a wide bench-table thing on one side of the far end of the room, and a giant tub on the other. There wasn't much equipment in there, but on the wall between the tub and the bench, a silky black robe had been hung up. When I approached it, I found that above it, a little screen kept blinking the words, "Strip down and redress in this garment. Your cosmetologists will be with you shortly". So I did as the screen said, since I knew I was going to find myself naked in front of glazed strangers anyway, whether I did what I was told or not. After sliding on the black robe, I sat on the cold metal table, and studied the room until three odd looking people entered the room.

They were all from Amity, which was obvious. But Amity from the Summit always like good entertainment, even if it means watching the death of twenty two teenagers on live television. They're still all about peace, and I guess that if the Divergent Games were messed with, a war would explode and the Amity would be able to do nothing about it but watch. Suddenly, I'm surprised by my own thoughts. Why am I thinking like an Amity?

It was three girls, all dressed in several different shades of reds and yellows. One wore a long red dress embroidered with yellow gems that reminded me of fire. Her fingers were gloved with yellow latex, which all of the girls had, and none of them looked happy about. The girl had coppery brown hair that blazed and flowed radically, so she looked like a ridiculous sun goddess. Another girl wore a strapless top that came down to her knees in silky waves, and red pants that swayed with every movement she made. She had platinum blonde hair and yellowish skin that made me think she was sick, but then I realized it was just a crazy Summit fashion. The last girl seemed almost normal. Her dress was a bunch of different reds and yellows and went down to a few inches above her ankles, and her hair hung down straight and black over her shoulders with a few feathers in the strands here and there.

"Whoa!" the middle girl said. Just from her remark I could tell she wasn't the brightest one of the group. She rushed over to me and leaned in front of me, which made me feel really uncomfortable. "Look at those lips! I didn't know District 11 had plastic surgeons_this_ good!" she put up a tentative finger to touch my face, but I smacked it away and turned my head toward the other girls.

"My lips are real. Okay?" I scowled, and try to push her away from me without touching her. "Now back off, you're making me feel claustrophobic." she backed away, but she looked insulted. The other two girls approached, but they were careful to keep their distance. I sighed. "Look, can we just get this over with? I'm in a bad mood." they all looked at me sympathetically, and then smiled.

"Of course. We'll try to make it as painless as possible." the girl with black hair stated, which sent a shudder through my body. What are they going to do that will give me pain? "My name is Aumora, and this is Belinda," she pointed to the girl with coppery brown hair beside her who has yet to speak up. "And this is Ralenia." she gestured to the girl with yellow skin, and Aumora's eyebrows raised like she already knew my opinion of Ralenia, and agreed with me that she was, indeed, very dimwitted.

And that's when they told me to lie down, and they gave me the most horrible pain I've ever felt probably in my entire life, and I still have yet to go into the Divergent Games.

**End**

**Chapter 2**

**The Divergent Games**

_**Here's a link to the page the idea for this story was originally formed of:**_

.com/RoleplayingtheHungerGames


End file.
